Chairmen Green, Garbarino Request Public Testimony From CrowdStrike CEO Following Global IT Outage

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Mark E. Green, MD (R-TN) and Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) sent a letter to CrowdStrike Chief Executive Officer George Kurtz, requesting his public testimony before the Committee regarding the global information technology (IT) outage that occurred last Friday. The outage was attributed to a "defect" in a CrowdStrike software update. The cascading effects impacted key functions of the global economy including aviation, healthcare, banking, media, and emergency services. Read the full letter here and excerpts below.

Read more from Cristiano Lima-Strong via The Washington Post.

In the letter, the Chairmen write, "We write in response to the global information technology (IT) outage, which has been attributed to a "defect" in a CrowdStrike software update that impacted Microsoft Windows. While we appreciate CrowdStrike's response and coordination with stakeholders, we cannot ignore the magnitude of this incident, which some have claimed is the largest IT outage in history. In less than one day, we have seen major impacts to key functions of the global economy, including aviation, healthcare, banking, media, and emergency services. Recognizing that Americans will undoubtedly feel the lasting, real-world consequences of this incident, they deserve to know in detail how this incident happened and the mitigation steps CrowdStrike is taking."
The Chairmen continue, "In light of these sweeping impacts, we are relieved that you confirmed that "[t]his is not a security incident or cyberattack." However, this incident must serve as a broader warning about the national security risks associated with network dependency. Malicious cyber actors backed by nation-states, such as China and Russia, are watching our response to this incident closely. In fact, as CrowdStrike relayed in a recent blog post, malicious actors presumably targeting your Latin American customers have already seized the moment and sought to exploit the vulnerability. Protecting our critical infrastructure requires us to learn from this incident and ensure that it does not happen again."
The Chairmen conclude, "Given the urgency and global scale of this incident, we respectfully request that CrowdStrike schedule a hearing with the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection by no later than 5:00pm on Wednesday, July 24, 2024."

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